# Key Points from IRC Discussion

• Participants explored alternative energy technologies, including wave energy from a promising location 220 miles south of Alaska with 30-foot waves, methane harvesting from natural ocean floor seeps near LA (estimated at 4 megawatts potential), and high-altitude kite power systems.

• A computer vision project called ProFORMA was shared (http://mi.eng.cam.ac.uk/~qp202/my_papers/BMVC09/) that creates automatic 3D meshes from video, though the output quality was noted to be limited.

• The group discussed brain-computer interfaces, debating whether direct numerical computation could be presented to the brain, with skepticism about bypassing sensory interfaces like vision and hearing with current technology.

• An article about optogenetics from Wired sparked discussion about the field's advancement, including in vivo experiments with mice and monkeys that demonstrated surprising progress in direct neural control.

• Significant tension emerged between competing open hardware design library projects ("bildr" versus "skdb"), highlighting community disagreements about collaboration approaches in open-source transhumanist technology development.

• Technical discussions covered encryption features in torrent clients that could protect users in regions with restrictive internet monitoring, and web development considerations for collaborative platforms including URL namespace management and access control.